General Synod

Our General Synod begins today in Edinburgh,

Anybody with long experience in ministry knows to approach Synods, Annual Meetings, Easter Vestries and the like with a degree of healthy caution. You never know.

But in general I look forward to this. Scottish geography and our relative smallness conspire to prevent us having the kind of inter-diocesan contact which helps to build a sense of being together. So our General Synod is important and encouraging in building our sense of who we are and where we are going as a church. And we are quite upbeat at present.

My key focus is of course on the Anglican Covenant debate. We are slightly taken aback because our mood seemed to be that we were prepared to stand alone if necessary in our lack of enthusiasm for it. And now the Church of England has got there before us. That wasn’t in the plan. But it seems to me that, whatever our feelings about the Covenant, we defer to no one in our enthusiasm for the Anglican Communion.

I’ll also be glad to see the Whole Church Mission and Ministry Policy continuing to move forward. I know this is a bit geekish. But I have been greatly encouraged by the way our church has been bravely working on this at many levels. I think its time has come.